S and I were at a wedding on Saturday. There was a touch of a library theme to the decor. The seating assignments were printed on those vertical index-card-sized slips that you used to find in library books. Among the decorations, they had rented some vintage books from a local thrift shop.
Browsing the selections, we found a book called Enduring Passion: Further New Contributions to the Solution of Sex Difficulties being the continuation of MARRIED LOVE. (Yes, that capitalization is in the actual subtitle.) This seemed like an odd selection to have on display at a wedding. It turns out the bride and groom had not selected specific titles, but merely identified which color groups they were looking for; the shop made the selections. I wonder if the shop owners had picked that one out specifically; seems rude, if you ask me.
It's one of those books -- published in 1928 (though this version was printed in 1931) -- that was advanced for its time but reads as comical now. I had such a good time paging through it at the reception that I kept it so I could finish it up. (Don't worry, I told the bride, and I offered to send the shop the $1.00 price that was written inside the cover if they desired such remuneration for this gem.)
It wasn't until we were on the way home the following day that I noticed that the author was a woman: Marie Carmichael Stopes. She was quite an accomplished young scientist, earning D.Sc. and PhD degrees by the time she was 24 years old. However, she had then what was a controversial position on birth control and has now a complicated history when it comes to other social issues, including eugenics and abortion. I've no desire to do a full recitation here, but you can read about it on the interwebs if you'd like.
Regardless, an entertaining collection of pages to flip through ... especially at a wedding!
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